Wednesday, September 05, 2007

Clearing Off the Turntable

hardly ever get to listen to my vinyl these days because there's always 4 tall piles of cds and dvds on top of the turntable -- it's too convenient to not stack them up there -- but i cleared them off at the end of last week in order to get some vinyl going on the music hall i got a couple years back. part of this is inspired by the new heavy vinyl we're doing on Merge releases, but more to relieve the guilt i feel for neglecting my record collection. i have some (though not most) of these on CD, too, but once you get going with the records it's hard to stop. because records sound good when you listen to them:

The Chills - Submarine Bells and Brave Words both getting some spinsAndrew Hill - Invitation, a pretty rocking 70's trio disc on SteeplechaseJoe Simon - Drowning In A Sea of Love, a Gamble and Huff production from 1972Chet Baker - Let's Get Lost, the soundtrack from the Bruce Weber filmIsley Brothers - Brother, Brother, Brother...got this on the tour Superchunk did on the way back from Cali after recording On the Mouth. so weird that i can remember certain stores where i got certain records, even if the records in question i maybe listen to once a year (or less).Big Star - Radio CityTom Waits and Crystal Gayle - One From the Heart soundtrack...also the 7" Anti did of "Lie To Me"Miles Davis - 'Round About Midnight with the terrible Columbia cover w/ the blue border around the edge, i love that record. also Miles Davis Volume 2, which i got at the old location of the awesome Jazz Record Mart in Chicago.

gonna try to keep it cleared off as long as i can stay in the hang of getting up from whatever i'm doing (eg watching the US Open into the wee hours) to turn the records over...

3 Comments:

Love your music, long, long time fan, and I was just curious to hear your take on the whole file sharing/ downloading of music issue. I'm assuming you're still a part of Merge, so I could see you being especially involved and concerned, but here's my dilemma - music gets leaked usually a couple months before an album is released these days. So I do the free download thing and then a couple months later, actually purchase the album.

But that purchase just feels almost wasteful. How much is actually going to the band? The label? Someone else? I certainly want the band to make money and would love to reward them for such great work, but there seems like there should be a better way, although I don't know what it is. It's just that buying a CD several months AFTER I've already listened to the album over and over again seems kind of silly and I can't imagine everyone is as willing as me to give up their cash for something that adds almost no value at that point.

Thanks for reading (and blogging, and singing, and everything else over the years),Bill

sometimes i too will look for something online before it's out because i'm dying to hear it, then go buy it when it's actually available -- recent albums by Feist, Bill Callahan, & others for instance. yes, when you buy the album (either cd or digital) the band and the label get paid. how much each get from a sale depends on the deal that the band has with the label, how much of a discount the label had to give retail to get it into the fancy rack it's in at the front of the store, etc.if you feel like the physical CD is a waste of plastic and paper, then buy the album digitally, but yeah you should buy it if you want the artists you like to keep making money from their music so they can keep making music!

Thanks Mac, sounds good to me. I'm definitely all in favor of supporting the artists and the indie labels as much as I can. A few labels have offered some bonuses along with pre-orders (New Pornographers, for instance) which is an extra incentive to pay for the album at the same time as downloading. Keep up the great music!